


Despairtale

by PartilliaPie



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Timeline, But then it gets straight up depressing, Gen, Happy Ending (Probably), It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Post-Undertale Neutral Route - Neutral Pacifist Ending, Reader Is Not Frisk, Team story but I'm the only one with an AO3 account, kinda cute
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-19
Updated: 2018-01-13
Packaged: 2018-10-20 20:35:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,265
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10670295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PartilliaPie/pseuds/PartilliaPie
Summary: Yo! I'm just on a roll this past week! Oh wait, this isn't even 500 words yet.Anyways!My baby sis is doing a project with some fabulous people and it just happens to be an Undertale alternate timeline game!This is a cute publicity stunt that I'm more than happy to help with. They need to get themselves out there! And who am I to deny them that very courtesy?I was gonna make a joke about the MTT Brand Emporium, but I'll settle with posing dramatically as I write.What are you still doing here? Read the bloody story!Update:The game has been cancelled, but that won't stop me from writing this fic! I WON'T DIE THAT EASILY!!





	1. The Hole

**Author's Note:**

> Hm.

This hole is so deep. You can't even see the bottom. You threw a nickel into this pool of black a few minutes ago and you didn’t hear it hit the bottom. Maybe it’s sandy down there or something.

If you were smart, you wouldn't be here. But you're not smart. You know that already. Not dumb either; just curious. What's at the bottom of this hole? 

There are rumors about this place. Or at least this mountain in general. Nine people have come up this mountain and disappeared, presumably dead. People say random things to explain them when really no one knows what’s actually going on. 

_‘There are dangerous animals out there! Don’t you know that coyotes like to stalk around at night?’_ Human remains haven't been found on the mountain. And you highly doubt every single one of them ran into a pack of coyotes and died.

 _‘It’s aliens, dude! They’re comin’!’_ There's no solidly noted paranormal activity near or on the mountain.

 _‘Remember, when bad kiddies go up the mountain, the monsters eat them.’_ There's no secret society cult hidden somewhere and monsters don’t exist. Parents really need to find a better trick to get their children to behave.

These people just came here and never came back. No need to answer a question no one really knows the answer to yet.

The latest case was three years ago. A kid named Frisk Sonara was the one that disappeared. You can't really recall much about that kid, not even their gender or age. Their name was practically branded into your head though. Did they go to your school? Did they live next door? How old were you when you saw that news report? Maybe nine or ten? To be frank, the search party gave up after about a day when Mt. Ebott was mentioned. They knew they wouldn’t find Frisk.

How hasn't anyone found this hole? It’s not even very well hidden. Just up the mountain path, actually. You don’t know why a hike up the mountain that everyone said not to go up alone sounded so appealing, but now you’re neither regretting it or enjoying it.

…

….

You’re gonna… You’re gonna disappear, too, aren’t you? You don’t know how, but you can feel it. There's a negative energy that is sucking you in.

But you don’t wanna disappear. Of course, there’s not much to go back to, but you can still make something to always come back to. 

You’re not disappearing.

You stand up to walk away, but a lurch of something tells you to run. So you do.

Or at least you try.

You feel it. A rock that wasn’t behind you and a root that you know wasn't there.

You trip.

You’re falling.

You’re falling!

No no no nonononono!

_HELP!_


	2. You Fell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You fell

_**You remember those news reports. It's one of those events that makes you remember what you were wearing that day and what you had for breakfast.** _

_**Well, you were wearing a grey sweater and jeans. You had a poppyseed muffin for breakfast.** _

_**A kid named Frisk around your age went missing on Mt Ebott that morning.** _

_“Our next news story is on the mysterious disappearance of Frisk Sonara. Last seen on September 5th near Mt. Ebott. The child is 3 feet 5 inches with brown…”_

_**Frisk was blamed...** _

_“Told ya. These kids are gettin’ more and more stupid these days! Like, I mean…”_

_**… along with their, uh...** _

_“... such terrible parents! To let their child climb a mountain by themselves! No wonder that poor child went missing!”_

_**...“parents"...** _

_“What parents? Frisk was in the system.”_

_**… and everyone knew they wouldn't find them...** _

_“Ebott? Haha, yeah… They ain't gonna find the kid…”_

_**...** _

_“... took Frisk! Frisk was bad and the monsters took Frisk!”_

°*°*°*°*

You wake up and… it's dark and your everything hurts… The smell of crushed flower petals invades your nose. Ew. You flip yourself over onto your back and you only see darkness with a circle of dim light in the middle-ish.

You stretch your arms and retract them. Nothing feels broken, but you don't wanna get up just yet.

You're in a daze. Your eyes won't focus yet and you feel like you're in limbo or something. Your head hurts so bad...

How long were you asleep..?

A small bug thing crawls across and your cheek and you smack yourself to squish it. Heh, your hand comes back all sticky with bug innards and flower juice. You wipe your hand on your jacket.

Your eyes start adjusting and you can see that it's not just black in here. There are tall, tall pillars around you with green vines wrapped around them. And you're bedded in a cluster of flowers. You know their name, but it's lost on you.

What happened? Where are you, anyways? All you remember is that you were at a hole in Mt. Ebott and…

You fell…

Oh God, you fell!

You force yourself up to your feet, the sudden realization making you frantic. Your head is smarting the fast movement, but you don't care. You have to get back up there! You _**need**_ to!

You grab at the vines that cling to the walls and pillars, but they don't support your weight. You try climbing the wall itself only to fall every time you scale more than a foot.

_Please, please, please no!_ You need to get out! You can't disappear!

How could you be so stupid?! You knew you weren't supposed to go out here! You knew people don't come back! You knew that if anything happened to you, nobody would look for you because of this stupid mountain and the stupid myth and stupid you and, and….

You don't even know when you started crying, but it won't stop…Your body is agitated from the useless exertion you just forced yourself through and you're scared and you don't know what to do… 

You wanna go home!

...

_***The thought that you will never get out fills you with DESPAIR** _

_***[Progress SAVED]** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be straight with you, these chapters are gonna be short. I'm making each chapter a minimum of 500 words instead of my usual 1,000. Sorry...


	3. Buttercups

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You meet a cheery flower!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so little warning here (ooo, I haven't done one of these yet!). This chapter is kind of violent. Well, not violent-violent, but.... It's not pretty.
> 
> And this is my first time writing something like this, so please don't punch me too hard.

….

Who said that? You look around with blurry vision, but you don't see anyone. You could have sworn you heard… 

Is that a path? You wipe your eyes and can see that, yes, there is definitely a path up ahead. Maybe that's a way out of here?

You walk down the short path and… Is that music? The farther you go down, more distinct it gets. It's bouncy. 

You reach what looks like a grand archway. It's really tall and a grayish purple color. There's a weird symbol at the top made of a circle, wings, and three triangles.

It's kinda pretty.

You go through and it's an empty cave, save for a patch of grass in the middle. It'd probably be pitch black in here if it weren't for the sunlight shining over the small patch.

The music is still playing, very clearly now. There's no seeable source, though.

And there's a golden flower in the middle of it. It's _huge_. Especially compared to the small ones you landed on.

You walk closer to the spotlighted flower and see _holy stars **it hAS A FACE--**_

“Greetings!”

“AH!”

You startle back and fall on your butt. A flower has a face and it is talking to you!

That was so cool!

“Oh my! Are you okay? Did I scare you?” The flower is still talking! You vigorously shake your head ‘no'.

Who would be scared of a flower?

“That's great! My name is Buttercup! Buttercup the… Buttercup…” The flower looks kind of annoyed? Heh, you would be annoyed, too, if you were named Person the Person.

Now that you think about it… What is your name? It's…. your name is… Hm. You don't remember. You should be more concerned than you feel at the moment.

The flower cranes itself closer, getting a closer look at you. “Would you have happened to have fallen down that hole down the way?”

You nod. Yes, you did! Can the flower help you?

“Oh, you must be so confused! Here, let me assist you!”

You feel the air in the room kind of just… drop. It feels like you’re submerged in water, but you're not? Everything just feels just so dulled and muffled all the sudden.

Buttercup mutters something, but you didn't catch it. They look fixated on…

Oh.

It's a heart.

A literal grey cartoony heart hovering in front of your chest.

“You see that gray heart? That's your soul! It's what makes you, you!” Buttercup chirps cheerfully. Or you think they chirped?

Soul? Isn't that a little… on the nose? Well, if it really does make a person, the word ‘soul’ would make sense. 

You kind of would have expected something called a soul to be a bit more grandiose, though. Maybe more color or brighter or less boring or sad looking? You dunno.

“Okay, human. Hold still so I can heal you from your fall. Okay?”

You nod and….

The music stops.

You don't even see the knife coming. You don't see it slice through your jacket and make a very deep cut in your arm. You don't see it.

But you can feel it.

And wow, you didn't know anything could hurt this bad. Ever.

Oh, when did you start screaming? When did you curl up on the floor in pain? You don't remember. You can't think.

Another knife plunges into your back, close to wedging itself into your spine. It's embedded in your lung before disappearing, leaving a large, bleeding wound. There's too much liquid. You painfully cough up blood, adding to the pool your arm is making.

God, your blood is staining everything. Your sweater, your shirt, the ground, your skin, even your soul a little. The red swirls across the surface as if your soul were wet and you were putting droplets of ink in. You knew you wanted color in your soul, but this is… disturbing… Unintentionally painting it with your blood.

You look up at Buttercup in horrified question. Are they doing this to you? _Why are they doing this to you?_

You can barely see them through the blur of tears, but you can make one very clear thing out. They're staring at you. With a sick expression of complete hunger over your dying form.

But why..?

Another knife jabs into your chest, barely missing your soul. An uncontrolled flurry of red erupts from your mouth. The blood from your chest spills onto your soul, almost making it look like it's been red from the start.

Why are they doing this…?

What did… did you do…. to……..

Your vision flickers.

Your mind slowly blanks.

The last thing you hear is what sounds like fine glass shattering and Buttercup screaming absolute blasphemy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *walking around with hot cocoa*
> 
> Would anyone like some? 
> 
> ~~~~
> 
> I questioned my mental state when I realized I was describing in detail a child being stabbed to death. I believe that Butters summons physical knives instead of white attacks. White attacks hit you, but only take away so much HP. Physical attacks, well, they hit and use physical logic. If you get hit, you better get healed/hope it heals up itself or else you actually can bleed out and die. Think of it as KR that doesn't care if you're good or not, your HP is gonna keep dropping until you stop it.
> 
> So, uh, yeah. Avoid Butters.


	4. Wake Up Call

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wake up.
> 
> Stay determined.

Recap: You died.

You don't exactly know how you feel about that.

Wait, wait, that came out wrong. Dying didn't feel good. It hurt. It hurt a lot. But _being_ dead is different. It's like you're sleeping without a dream, but you aren't asleep. You're too self aware right now to be sleeping. You've been here for, what, a few minutes? An hour? You really feel timeless here.

Where ‘here' is, you dunno. It's just you and some glowing buttons in a pitch black area. The buttons say “Continue" and “Stop”.

You've been ignoring it, but uh… There's been something in the back of your head saying to “wake up". There's other bits mainly consisting of something about “determination". That's just metaphorically screaming to choose ‘Continue’.

But you don't really feel determined for anything, really. You're mostly tired. That ‘Stop’ button is looking kind of tempting. You don't know what exactly that button does, but you have a fair idea or two.

What does continue mean, though? Do you continue bleeding on the floor, only to die again? Or do you turn into a ghost or something?

….

Okay, you're curious. Worst case scenario, you die again and end up here, anyways.

You push ‘Continue’.

~-~-~-~-

_**[LOAD in Progress]** _

°*°*°*°*

You wake up and… it's dark and your everything hurts… The smell of crushed flower petals invades your nose. Ew. You flip yourself over onto your back and you only see darkness with a circle of dim light in the middle-ish.

You stretch your arms and retract them. Nothing feels broken, but you don't wanna get up just yet.

You're in a daze. Your eyes won't focus yet and you feel like you're in limbo or something. Your head hurts so bad...

How long were you asleep..?

A small bug thing crawls across your face and-- _WAIT A SECOND HOLD ON!!_

You smack the bug off your face because ew and whoa you're alive! Are you a ghost? You pick up a flower. Nope. Sleeping? You give yourself a slap on the arm. Okay, that hurt, so no.

Holy cow, you're alive again! This is so weird! You fell down, then you cried, and you met this flower named…

_Buttercup!_ What the ‘H’ ‘E’ double hockey sticks (excuse your language), dude?! The flower killed you! You got killed by a flower! With knives?? How does a flower even wield magical floaty knives?!

You lift up your shirt to see if there's a stab wound there, but your skin is just as not stabbed as it was when you first fell down. No, your arm hasn't been maimed. You'll assume your back is in similar shape.

So, of you have a good grasp on what's going on, there's a homicidal flower in the room down the path, you can die and revive yourself, and… You're stuck.

What do you do now?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am sad to say that the development of the game Despairtale has been terminated :(
> 
> BUT THAT'S NOT GONNA STOP ME!! YOUR DREAM WILL LIVE ON, SIS!
> 
> But seriously, I'm not abandoning this story any time soon if it kills me.

**Author's Note:**

> *sips chocolate syrup*


End file.
